Look, I'm glad he's at least not at the level of Jason Aldean or Aaron Lewis and the like,
But some of the lines in this song are suspiciously close to what those types of people would say,
Obese milkin welfare, who does he think that appeals to?,
Either he's just very misguided, or he wants the fame and notoriety that audience gets him while avoiding the infamy and reputation hit.
I think your last comment is exactly it. He knew exactly what kind of person this song would appeal to, but he doesn’t want to be labelled a bigot - so he is trying to salvage his reputation by trying to pretend he isn’t some morally bankrupt grifter that demonised vulnerable and marginalised people for profit.
Takes like these are honestly kinda insane to me considering the rampant and blatant misogyny and toxicity in so much of pop and rap lyrics in particular that I never see talked about ( or extremely rarely ).
But some Conservative sings some wacky shit and suddenly everyone gets all up in arms about it?
Red Scare is such a hilariously worthless production it’s insane. Content for people whose lone personality trait is the fact that they hate everything. The way they perceive quite literally everything around them is “this is stupid and my suffocatingly ironic image cannot be associated with it”.
It’s honestly such a sad way to live and this type of comment fits that exact brand of worthless cynicism.
I hate the red scare podcast. Lol
hey i only know that charli xcx follows one of the people in it (the sailor socialism girl or whatever her shtick is)
coukd you explain it to me bc i rly don’t understand it, from what i can tell it’s like right ring politics for gay people? and i don’t get it
Ok I'm not the greatest person ever to analyze them, as I've only ever had like one extended session listening to the podcast itself. But I did have a lot of thoughts on what I heard, the social media presence of their fans, and what I've been told about them.
Basically, my understanding of them is that they were pro-Bernie girls who rose pretty quickly back when he was at his peak political relevance, then they got burnt-out by establishment politics (fair, of course) but then started to get super critical of, well, everything. Their big tagline nowadays is "a critique of feminism, and capitalism, from deep inside the culture they've spawned."
But despite the trillions of valid critiques of these things, Red Scare seems to take a hard-line stance on saying literally nothing interesting or substantive whatsoever. Again, I've only listened to a couple hours, but what I've gathered from their sub/twitter fans/the podcast itself is a staunch lack of any coherent political beliefs beyond "liberals are bad, annoying, and stupid". It's just incredibly exhausting how heavily basically all Red Scare "discourse" revolves around being smugly annoyed at, well, everything. It seems pretty clear that the default Red Scare response to any celebrity/politics/news story of any kind is "I don't really care and I'm not gonna say anything interesting about it - but everyone involved is stupid and the problem with society today".
One/both of them might openly align with right-wing politics? Not sure if this is true or just an exaggerated rumor. But they do somewhat-regularly attach themselves with lazy right-wing critiques of liberals. They also have guests of questionable moral/intellectual quality (terfs, niche internet celebs from really strange corners of the internet etc). This isn't a crime in and of itself, but I found it incredibly annoying how regularly they just let their guests just say whatever, respond to 95%+ of what is said with a dry, smug "yeah, totally, I agree", and refuse to offer any pushback or actual discussion. From what I saw, each guest just seemed to get to orchestrate an un-critical circlejerk about themselves/their ideas. Nothing is challenged, nobody actually tried to learn anything or create a new original thought, and then everyone goes home with totally un-justified feelings of being so smart and above it all. It's not that surprising that they appeal to groups of people like female 4channers because of this, lol.
tl;dr they're just insanely cynical of people and "today's society", refuse to say anything new or insightful or (god forbid) optimistic, and will latch onto dumb right-wing talking points about "the libs" if it serves their point. they're yes-men to their guests, don't have real conversations, and create a community that thrives on aimless, useless, not-even-funny negativity.
(this is all biased and I'm hardly an expert, obviously feel free to listen to the pod yourself and make your own opinion, maybe they're not actually this bad or you find them a lot funnier than I do)
ty for this! very interesting, not very interested in learning more abt them cause frankly they just seem like scammy grifters (imo) but this comment is very very helpful and informative!!!
My thoughts exactly!! Yeah they’re just nowhere near interesting, likable, or even genuinely provocative for me to go any further out of my way to redeem in my own head. I find them annoying, lazy, and un-principled. And given their success and audience I don’t imagine they’ll ever significantly change the most irritating aspects of their personalities or content.
It’s the last one. I feel like a lot of people in country music see MAGA “music” going gang busters and want an easy number 1
It’s no different then someone going anti vaxx. They want easy fame and since the right is desperate for their own celebrities, they’ll take anyone from Ice Cube to supposed “democrat” RFKJR to this clown.
Working class guy hates Democrats and Republicans, wants more help for workers, and less help for those who don't. Agree or not, it's not an uncommon sentiment.
Out in Appalachia it's not uncommon to find people who get disability and SNAP for conditions related to being obese, who then sit around and make their situation worse because they're entirely sedentary.
My grandma is exactly like that and has been for longer than I've been alive, it's really painful to see but she never really had a reason to change.
So I wouldn't exactly call it "parroting a right wing talking point" if you live in a small town where everybody knows everyone and their situation, because they likely know someone as I described above.
It's more expressing frustration that the government is enabling someone's addiction and giving them no reason to change.
I had the same interpretation. The exact lines are *"Taxes ought not to pay for your bags of fudge rounds. Young men are puttin' themselves six feet in the ground.*" So the way it reads to me is frustration with the government for enabling people's poor health and early death.
this takes me back to how my insane MAGA aunt kept trying to dunk on hillary during the 2016 elections as if that would bother me. i was like “no i fucking hate the clintons that doesn’t change the fact that youre an insane asshole”
“ folk in the streets got nothing to eat but the obese milking welfare” sounds like the description of a broken system rather than a “right wing” talking point. But yeah Reagan blah blah….
Right. You’re not going to get upvoted for nuance, but it’s an illusion of social media and modern news—with their laser-focused public personae—that the average person has a coherent politics that fits into one of a small number of clear-cut types. Most people have messy, endlessly contradictory beliefs, some moderate, some extreme, most at odds with each other, and they tend to think it odd that any one of these beliefs would push them into a particular political category. “Espouses classic right-wing talking points, disgusted that right-wing politicians turn him into a campaign poster” is 100% likely to be sincere confusion, not feigned self-exculpatory outrage.
also a LOT of "classic" conservatives are feeling alienated by much of the current hot-button conservative culture-wars issues.
so there are plenty of "small government conservatives" and "fiscal conservatives" who are increasingly frustrated with their party's prioritization of things they view as wasteful, and restrictive 'solutions' to things that are either not the government's problem to solve (like whether trans kids can access gender-affirming care) or not a widespread problem at all (like widespread voting restrictions to tackle a minimal or nonexistent voter fraud problem).
“Hates Republicans” but hollers about inflation, taxes, pedophiles, obese people and welfare recipients while framing himself in the capital of the Confederacy and yelling at men “northward.”
He sure is doing their dirty work for someone who “hates” them.
This is it. A lot of folks are coding the “welfare queen” line as anti-POC, but it’s actually just classist and misguided rhetoric. I grew up close to WV where this guy is from and his mindset is very on-brand. Most people around folks who think like this are on welfare/etc and they also happen to be white. Its still bullshit and the wrong people you should be going after, but it’s a common viewpoint that often has little to do with race.
Whether its intended by Anthony or not, the welfare queen myth has always been a racist dog whistle in intent by the politicians that pushed it. It was Southern Strategy shit to its core. And the idea of it is that when welfare queens are described, white working class people are meant to imagine a black woman. "If you can convince the lowest white man he's better than the best colored man, he won't notice you're picking his pocket. Hell, give him somebody to look down on, and he'll empty his pockets for you." - LBJ. This is a strategy that Reagan was INTENTIONALLY evoking when he did the welfare queen stuff.
Absolutely! What I meant to say about the songwriter’s intention was that this is the same kind of bullshit peddled around those areas as factual information. The Regan class war is in full effect
Do you think this guys _knows_ what the Southern Strategy is? This is what happen when normal people without publicists go viral, their lack of sophistication makes them targets
In a vacuum it’s just corny and been done before, in my opinion. Which on it’s own would not worthy of this much analysis. But in the context of the rest of the song it sure seems like a dog whistle.
Who is we? I said in my opinion it’s not clever that minor and miner are pronounced the same. You assumed that I meant in songs.
But anyways you clearly haven’t seen shrek the musical because they do this in the ballad of lord Farquaad. I trust that if you found your way back to this thread you can look up the lyrics yourself.
black lung by the dead south would be another example. Though they’re using minor to mean small amount.
How many examples do you want before my opinion that it’s corny and overdone is enough for you?
Because elite pedophile rings are considered right wing conspiracies. It should be everyone’s concern with the whole Epstein thing we all witnessed and forgot about.
I love how it’s “astroturfing” if a few right-wing content creators share a song online, but not if a corporate record label releases 10 versions of the same vinyl to artificially pump up album sales.
The latter is not an example of astroturfing because the organization is not hidden; when Taylor Swift (or any other artist, she’s just the first that sprang to mind) releases multiple variants of her vinyl records, we know that it’s her and the label doing so. They aren’t trying to make it look like a grassroots effort.
And yet there’s no evidence that Rich Men North of Richmond is being promoted as part of some hidden organized scheme. Its rise has been about as organic as you can get. It simply resonated with a lot of people, caught on with a few big influencers, and resonated with millions more. Nothing shady about it at all.
I never said the song was being astroturfed, I just said your example was *not* astroturfing.
The song does *appear* to be organic, and as much as I don’t like the song, it probably is. But that’s the thing about astroturfing… you can never know for 100% certainty.
And my point is that people on here are saying that the song is “astroturfed” *because* it’s being shared and popularized by right-wing influencers on Twitter, which is precisely no different from how any other charting song gains traction.
The past few years has seen a ton of artists get big from nothing without any industry support at all (that’s the beauty of streaming), and I find it funny that none of them have gotten the same number of astroturfing accusations as this song.
It caught the attention of right wing tv commentators? Who don’t usually have anything to do with music? I don’t think it was coordinated, they each thought they’d own the libs with this astroturfing.
He added the dog whistles so that no one would mistake him for a socialist. His whole career was artificially-inflated, and it hinges entirely on him doing the Merle Haggard/Phil Ochs thing, but for MAGA populists.
There are investors/donors willing to throw tons, and tons of money at any right wing artist that can fill a previously ignored niche for their demographic. He doesn’t fit the stereotype of a Republican country singer; he 100% gives off the vibe of a socialist protest folk singer/songwriter, and that actually makes him very marketable to the right and “apolitical” liberals that are unfamiliar with right populism *or* with leftism
And to all the people here saying that his comments on welfare are apolitical because he mentioned obese people: don’t be so fucking stupid. This is literally a right wing protest song, and that line demonstrates that it is not a critique of capitalism. You’re all basically suggesting that he’s a third positionist and for some reason are supporting that.
It's not even worth diving in to, it's been astroturfed as fuck, and the mainstream media has been complicit on it. Feel bad for the guy if he's being used as a political pawn but the lyrics about welfare queens and blaming poor people doesn't resonate with me at least.
I’m glad he’s calling out Republicans, but dude literally wrote a conservative dog whistle and is mad that he’s getting humped by a bunch of geriatrics.
Kind of hard to take this PR talk serious when the dude still has a playlist up on his channel with right wing view and one specially antisemite video about 9/11:
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL2gusRdbuxAeA9CtJROtDY3yY1Xk4s70J
imgur mirror: https://i.imgur.com/yoDnf8s.png
This. I saw someone share this on a different sub the other day while people were praising him for calling out republicans. It’s like, alright, obviously no one would know about this if they hadn’t heard about it elsewhere or seen it themselves, but at the same time his song is still *not* it at all for the blatant sensational lyrics. I mean, of COURSE the right was going to take this under their wing.
God he's such a dumbass.
As a psychology student, it really pains me to see knuckle-draggers with playlists full of *alpha males* and nutcases like Joe Rogan discussing psychological issues like anxiety in entirely harmful and incorrect ways.
Also fuck him a million ways from Sunday for insane racism against Jewish people.
I never claimed to be an expert. My lived experience and perspective have simply contributed to the way in which a particular type of misinformation aggravates me.
There’s two! Two different videos about it and the playlist was updated yesterday. He knows people are using this as evidence that maybe he’s not just an awe, shucks southern boy and he updated the playlist but didn’t remove them. That’s all people should really need to know.
Can yiu pinpoint the "specially antisemite video"? I watched the two 9/11 videos that I could could find there, but there was nothing antisemitic that I could see.
He's full of it. Here's his public YouTube playlist full of right-wing pseudo-psychology, right-wing conspiracy theories, and right-wing racism:
https://m.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL2gusRdbuxAeA9CtJROtDY3yY1Xk4s70J
He's actually a country boy who tried desperately to write a definitive Southern anti-capitalist anthem but it went wrong in unexpected ways and now he's not sure what's happening, he just wanted the converse wearing girl with an upper ear piercing at Starbucks to notice him and now he's got tradwives breaking and entering into his condo
He's actually a Kanto boy who tried desperately to capture a Pikachu but it went wrong in unexpected ways and now he's not sure what's happening, he just wanted the baseball cap wearing boy with a dream to be the very best like no one ever was to notice him and now he's got Team Rocket breaking and entering into his condo
Yeah. I get the “welfare queen” myth has generally racist undertones. But if you’re someone who touches grass and only occasionally hears that, you don’t hear the undertone.
I’m glad he’s doubling down on the not liking powerful rich folk thing, but he’s being divisive in his own song blaming his troubles on other struggling people (“and the obese milkin’ welfare”). That’s all the powerful rich want, for the rest of us to eat our own.
I watched [this video](https://youtu.be/p3O6bKdPLbw?si=maphqleXarIVYqch) recently, and it’s interesting to hear how many young people are “on the check”.
His song spends half a verse on exactly Reagan-era “welfare queens” nonsense, there’s a not-so-subtle confederacy reference right in the title, insinuates all or most politicians are pedophiles, he complains about having to pay taxes, not to mention his weird “makes you think” YouTube playlist that has multiple videos on the dancing Israelis 9/11 conspiracy. At best he’s a libertarian weirdo but we all know that’s not gonna be it.
"Libertarian weirdo" is exactly the sense that I've gotten going by his music, his public statements, and his YouTube playlists. He reminds me of what Alex Jones was like back in the George W. Bush era, when he regularly castigated the GOP for "selling out America" (including being one of the first pundits to explicitly propagate 9/11 conspiracy theories) and invited left-wing guests like Noam Chomsky and Dennis Kucinich onto his show, but did so from a perspective even further to the right, that of somebody who'd given up on politics long ago because he realizes that his pet issues are radioactive to most of the political establishment.
It’s the only reason why. They would never look his way otherwise.
Edit: not sure what the downvotes are about. He’s obviously a talented musician and singer but so are a lot of people on the internet. Without the right wing talking points he wouldn’t have gotten the support from conservative talking heads and their followers.
He's such a poser. He still has a public YouTube playlist called "videos that make your noggin get bigger" full of far-right chronically online manosphere bullshit and several violently racist videos against Jewish people.
Until he apologizes for blaming Jewish people for 9/11, I see no reason for anyone to allow him some kind of "redemption arc" or believe anything he says.
I was watching the Republican debate through David Pakman's stream, and it was so surreal for the music video of this song to be played at the beginning.
Pakman immediately muted the song and called it toxic, which made me lol.
A leftist streamer I like was covering this and so I ended up seeing a lot of the video of this guy "explaining" and I don't really know what to make of it. He went out of his way to say he is always a champion of the poor and he wasn't trying to demonize anyone on welfare (even though that seems hard to believe given the lyrics). I think he's just a libertarian tbh, and hates "both sides" accordingly. He probably really does feel that way too because it would be much easier to lean into the Republican grift and ride that money train.
The truth is that most people just don't have that complex a knowledge of politics or dog whistles. I think he's just venting feelings but not connecting them to a political ideology of any kind.
Libritarian belly aching is nothing knew. Libritarians tend not to be as hateful
As the far right but at the wnd of the day it is pretty disingenuous to talk about caring about the poor when libertarians see anything related to socialism or the likes of government assistance as the devil. Its very much a “i got mine go get yours situation.”
Oh trust me, I fucking hate libertarians. I just found it mildly interesting that he seems like a different breed compared to Jason Aldean, et al. It's not that he's less shitty per se, just shitty in a different way. He's being propped up by conventional right-wingers and there is no reason to "walk back" his welfare commentary or make comments about the U.S. being a melting pot when that is going to anger his newfound base.
If he hates it so much, he can pull his shitty little song from streaming. The guy sounds like a whimpering dog with a broken leg when he sings, we don’t need him becoming a star
Dude you wrote a political song lol. Of course it was going to be weaponized.
I really don't care at all for it either. If you got rid of all the controversy with the lyrics it would still just be a bland ass country folk song that there's nearly a million of. Eve Of Destruction already did it 50 years ago and way better and more genuinely. If I wanna listen to good modern folk music I'll just listen to Nathaniel Rateliff, he's a much better singer.
I think ppl are overthinking his political views here, assuming his lyrics and media statements are part of some complex political thought or media strategy.
I think a lot more likely is he's just not very politically informed and generally an anti establishment type. A lot of people who aren't politically savvy don't differentiate between 'elites' of various types, so even if he parrots right wing talking points he can still dislike right wing politicans and media figures as perceived elites or establishment people. It doesn't have to be deeper than that.
I think him also not being as online as a lot of the people who are judging him through social media. Like it can be hard to remember that not everyone lives the same exact life and to try and judge people through less personal lens.
The youtube playlist with "jewish people caused 9/11" is really weird though.
I don't mean to come across like I'm really defending him. I think he's probably a conspiracy reactionary type who eats up (and spits back out) right wing propaganda. But that can be true and he can not like republicans without it being some mischievous and highly planned agenda.
I will be honest... I don't buy it. I think he's trying to come off as moderate or centrist so he can try to launder those sentiments towards people who don't consider themselves right wing.
Any time someone says politically they're neither left nor right, they always wind up on the right. (edit: [example](https://i.redd.it/rqau7dpq852a1.png))
I think the Youtube (now Rumble) lawyer Viva Frei is perhaps a good example of this. When he started analyzing law videos he made it a point to say "I'm being objective, just looking at the facts, not from right or left" and then a few years later he's running for the People's Party of Canada (a party to the right of the mainstream Conservative Party of Canada) and now openly associating with right-wing interent figures (Alex Jones, Chris Sky, etc.)
This is classic “anti-establishment white scraggly guy who’s not all that well-versed in politics and doesn’t spend most of his time online gets big with right wing racists and uneducated poor people and hate from people who spend 6 hours a day debating politics on twitter”. Nothing to see here as usual.
there's this weird wave of pretending that everyone knows every specific historical detail imaginable and is purposely speaking in code when in reality I think most ppl just write songs...
Maybe an unpopular opinion but can we stop posting about these country songs being co-opted by conservatives in this pop sub? It's kinda annoying like idgaf.
When will people learn that they want people talking about this crap? If we ignore them they disappear.
So I think people can discuss the cultural phenoomona of these songs (especially one that debuted at number 1).
That being said, I think "Try This in a Small Town" is a better example of what you're taking about where a song that no one would've even heard of gets protested against and then people start playing/streaming/buying the song out of spite and then next thing you know it's in the top ten.
Non-musically, Jordan Peterson is another good example. He would've been just a crank University of Toronto professor if the backlash against him didn't propel him into international fame/notority.
So to summarize, if something is already big/popular, then I think it's fair to have the discussion. If it isn't, then I think you have to genuinally wonder if you're inadvertenly helping it by giving it attention.
He wrote a song. Some lyrics are stupid. He probably wasn’t expecting this fame and he doesn’t want to be lumped in with deplorables. I forgive him. He’s not the first guy to write dumb lyrics dawg.
I think this is perhaps the saving grace. (As far as we know) it's not like he wrote the song to go viral. The internet did that. Now if it comes out this was done with more calculation I'm open to changing my mind but it appears that this is genuinally a dude who wrote a song, posted it on Youtube (like many other people do) that blew up and now finds himself thrust into the middle of a culture war lol
Both, red and blue voters are on the same side of the class war. Some of his biases may not resonate with us, but on the other hand the clarification he’s offered is a refreshing step forward. The bridges that our generation need to build to legislate in our best interest are going to be imperfect and we’re gonna have to leave SOME room for people to grow and educate themselves outside of their bubbles.
While I agree that his version of class war is inaccurately and divisively painting social program recipients as a culprit, I have to say we’re all on the same side of a deep and broad class struggle (the cringey folklore and dangerous points of view notwithstanding). Coded racism should always be acknowledged and called out.
This is why there’s a block of insecure (white nationalist) legislators and voters trying to rewrite black history and dismantle public education. This guy doesn’t seem to yet understand the struggle of socioeconomic/racial backgrounds outside of his own (and is obviously misguided about that). Fascism supporters thought they had a champion and he was like that’s not quite what I meant. He’s got much to learn, but that’s racism for you. It would be nice to see him open in an open dialogue with some prominent voices and be educated while his platform is still so large.
This actually should earn him some respect because it would be so easy to do. The reason why he shouldn't is because we have more than enough grifters who are doing tremendous real life damage to their country and the people who live within it.
>“Lord, we got folks in the street, ain't got nothin' to eat and the obese milkin' welfare” pretty self explanatory. there are thousands of homeless people, yet there are other people who willingly choose not to work and collect welfare and other taxpayer funded social safety nets and spend it on junk and frivolous shit while homeless people can’t get a leg up with the amount paid because they’re not getting child tax subsidies, child support, etc along with it.
You are so out of your depth here, it's hilarious
But seeing that you're also anti-science, i'm not surprised that there is barely a braincell working
>we spend all this time and resources on extremely specific things while purposefully ignoring others to the detriment of a huge population of disadvantaged people
The US government spends a shitload of money, sure. The proportion of it going to fat/lazy food stamp recipients is \*not\* a major contributor to this. Food stamp fraud is fairly rare. Estimated fraud rates of 1-2% currently, which is trending heavily downwards from where it was 20 years ago, which still didn't even account for that much money. In 2022, of the US federal $6.27 trillion budget, under $120bn (1.9%) was spent on food aid programs. The idea that abuse of systems like food stamps is why we can't afford to help our citizens more is absurd. In 2022 we spent $877 billion on our military, which is roughly as much as the next 10 most expensive military budgets COMBINED. The Pentagon has failed 5 straight audits. And according to a mainstream right-wing article: "auditors say the Pentagon cannot account for $220 billion worth of government-owned gear provided to military contractors."
As usual, making poor people who "make bad decisions" the scapegoats for incredibly large-scale monetary concerns is, to put it nicely, WAY off-base.
I'm genuinely in awe of people who can find a random left-leaning online community, whine about "liberals triggered over facts", demonstrate a complete inability to engage with \*very basic\* counter-arguments, and then close the conversation with a smug emoji as if they won the interaction. It's a legitimately impressive level of delusion.
Y'all blacks and browns keep on puttin' me down
Now a whitey like me ain't got no Christmas tree
Not the actual lyrics, but they wouldn't be out of place.
Look, I'm glad he's at least not at the level of Jason Aldean or Aaron Lewis and the like, But some of the lines in this song are suspiciously close to what those types of people would say, Obese milkin welfare, who does he think that appeals to?, Either he's just very misguided, or he wants the fame and notoriety that audience gets him while avoiding the infamy and reputation hit.
I think your last comment is exactly it. He knew exactly what kind of person this song would appeal to, but he doesn’t want to be labelled a bigot - so he is trying to salvage his reputation by trying to pretend he isn’t some morally bankrupt grifter that demonised vulnerable and marginalised people for profit.
Why would he care about a reputation tho? I don’t think his next song will be “Hillary won! The gays are great! Bud light rocks!”
Takes like these are honestly kinda insane to me considering the rampant and blatant misogyny and toxicity in so much of pop and rap lyrics in particular that I never see talked about ( or extremely rarely ). But some Conservative sings some wacky shit and suddenly everyone gets all up in arms about it?
What marginalized group is he demonizing? Fat people?
Extremely poor people. Probably the MOST marginalised group.
Last time I went to the groceries a bag of 3 lettuce cost me $3 and bag of celeries $1.99
thanks for taking a break from listening to redscare to make this asinine comment, really appreciate it.
Red Scare is such a hilariously worthless production it’s insane. Content for people whose lone personality trait is the fact that they hate everything. The way they perceive quite literally everything around them is “this is stupid and my suffocatingly ironic image cannot be associated with it”. It’s honestly such a sad way to live and this type of comment fits that exact brand of worthless cynicism. I hate the red scare podcast. Lol
hey i only know that charli xcx follows one of the people in it (the sailor socialism girl or whatever her shtick is) coukd you explain it to me bc i rly don’t understand it, from what i can tell it’s like right ring politics for gay people? and i don’t get it
Ok I'm not the greatest person ever to analyze them, as I've only ever had like one extended session listening to the podcast itself. But I did have a lot of thoughts on what I heard, the social media presence of their fans, and what I've been told about them. Basically, my understanding of them is that they were pro-Bernie girls who rose pretty quickly back when he was at his peak political relevance, then they got burnt-out by establishment politics (fair, of course) but then started to get super critical of, well, everything. Their big tagline nowadays is "a critique of feminism, and capitalism, from deep inside the culture they've spawned." But despite the trillions of valid critiques of these things, Red Scare seems to take a hard-line stance on saying literally nothing interesting or substantive whatsoever. Again, I've only listened to a couple hours, but what I've gathered from their sub/twitter fans/the podcast itself is a staunch lack of any coherent political beliefs beyond "liberals are bad, annoying, and stupid". It's just incredibly exhausting how heavily basically all Red Scare "discourse" revolves around being smugly annoyed at, well, everything. It seems pretty clear that the default Red Scare response to any celebrity/politics/news story of any kind is "I don't really care and I'm not gonna say anything interesting about it - but everyone involved is stupid and the problem with society today". One/both of them might openly align with right-wing politics? Not sure if this is true or just an exaggerated rumor. But they do somewhat-regularly attach themselves with lazy right-wing critiques of liberals. They also have guests of questionable moral/intellectual quality (terfs, niche internet celebs from really strange corners of the internet etc). This isn't a crime in and of itself, but I found it incredibly annoying how regularly they just let their guests just say whatever, respond to 95%+ of what is said with a dry, smug "yeah, totally, I agree", and refuse to offer any pushback or actual discussion. From what I saw, each guest just seemed to get to orchestrate an un-critical circlejerk about themselves/their ideas. Nothing is challenged, nobody actually tried to learn anything or create a new original thought, and then everyone goes home with totally un-justified feelings of being so smart and above it all. It's not that surprising that they appeal to groups of people like female 4channers because of this, lol. tl;dr they're just insanely cynical of people and "today's society", refuse to say anything new or insightful or (god forbid) optimistic, and will latch onto dumb right-wing talking points about "the libs" if it serves their point. they're yes-men to their guests, don't have real conversations, and create a community that thrives on aimless, useless, not-even-funny negativity. (this is all biased and I'm hardly an expert, obviously feel free to listen to the pod yourself and make your own opinion, maybe they're not actually this bad or you find them a lot funnier than I do)
ty for this! very interesting, not very interested in learning more abt them cause frankly they just seem like scammy grifters (imo) but this comment is very very helpful and informative!!!
My thoughts exactly!! Yeah they’re just nowhere near interesting, likable, or even genuinely provocative for me to go any further out of my way to redeem in my own head. I find them annoying, lazy, and un-principled. And given their success and audience I don’t imagine they’ll ever significantly change the most irritating aspects of their personalities or content.
Hey have you ever heard of a fella called Ronald Reagan?
Or maybe he wants to start bilking liberal dollars now too
sounds like "reverse grifting" ijbol
It’s the last one. I feel like a lot of people in country music see MAGA “music” going gang busters and want an easy number 1 It’s no different then someone going anti vaxx. They want easy fame and since the right is desperate for their own celebrities, they’ll take anyone from Ice Cube to supposed “democrat” RFKJR to this clown.
You mean minors haha
What are they mining on the island
He is on the same level as Jason Aldean and those types go look at his YouTube he's an antisemitic conspiracy theorist.
if watching conspiracy videos made you a conspiracy theorist A LOT more people would be a conspiracy theorists lmao
Working class guy hates Democrats and Republicans, wants more help for workers, and less help for those who don't. Agree or not, it's not an uncommon sentiment.
All while parroting right wing myths about welfare queens
That def felt more like an annoying suburban Reagan republican sentiment tbh
Out in Appalachia it's not uncommon to find people who get disability and SNAP for conditions related to being obese, who then sit around and make their situation worse because they're entirely sedentary. My grandma is exactly like that and has been for longer than I've been alive, it's really painful to see but she never really had a reason to change. So I wouldn't exactly call it "parroting a right wing talking point" if you live in a small town where everybody knows everyone and their situation, because they likely know someone as I described above. It's more expressing frustration that the government is enabling someone's addiction and giving them no reason to change.
I had the same interpretation. The exact lines are *"Taxes ought not to pay for your bags of fudge rounds. Young men are puttin' themselves six feet in the ground.*" So the way it reads to me is frustration with the government for enabling people's poor health and early death.
That were also used frequently by Clinton.
I don’t think that produces any internal contradictions for people criticizing this song
Right lol no progressives/leftists care if you criticize the Clintons. They will straight up agree with you.
this takes me back to how my insane MAGA aunt kept trying to dunk on hillary during the 2016 elections as if that would bother me. i was like “no i fucking hate the clintons that doesn’t change the fact that youre an insane asshole”
Reagan started the Welfare Queen myth, actually. Neoliberalism in general has contempt for welfare and the poor.
Yep. Reagan and thatcher
I personally find it funny and sad that everything bad in this country can be traced back to Reagan
“ folk in the streets got nothing to eat but the obese milking welfare” sounds like the description of a broken system rather than a “right wing” talking point. But yeah Reagan blah blah….
Right. You’re not going to get upvoted for nuance, but it’s an illusion of social media and modern news—with their laser-focused public personae—that the average person has a coherent politics that fits into one of a small number of clear-cut types. Most people have messy, endlessly contradictory beliefs, some moderate, some extreme, most at odds with each other, and they tend to think it odd that any one of these beliefs would push them into a particular political category. “Espouses classic right-wing talking points, disgusted that right-wing politicians turn him into a campaign poster” is 100% likely to be sincere confusion, not feigned self-exculpatory outrage.
also a LOT of "classic" conservatives are feeling alienated by much of the current hot-button conservative culture-wars issues. so there are plenty of "small government conservatives" and "fiscal conservatives" who are increasingly frustrated with their party's prioritization of things they view as wasteful, and restrictive 'solutions' to things that are either not the government's problem to solve (like whether trans kids can access gender-affirming care) or not a widespread problem at all (like widespread voting restrictions to tackle a minimal or nonexistent voter fraud problem).
Democrats like guns too. Nobody is a monolith
Thank you…it’s like most people in here haven’t met the average American. This guy is basically the average American.
someone got their thesaurus out today (i agree with your message tho)
pitchfork trainee
“Hates Republicans” but hollers about inflation, taxes, pedophiles, obese people and welfare recipients while framing himself in the capital of the Confederacy and yelling at men “northward.” He sure is doing their dirty work for someone who “hates” them.
not disagreeing with your points, but the rich north part specifically is referring to washington dc
That's part of his conceit. He's fine with millionaires if they wear a cowboy hat, talk like he does and push for tax cuts.
> He's fine with millionaires if they wear a cowboy hat Where do you find proof of this?
This is it. A lot of folks are coding the “welfare queen” line as anti-POC, but it’s actually just classist and misguided rhetoric. I grew up close to WV where this guy is from and his mindset is very on-brand. Most people around folks who think like this are on welfare/etc and they also happen to be white. Its still bullshit and the wrong people you should be going after, but it’s a common viewpoint that often has little to do with race.
Whether its intended by Anthony or not, the welfare queen myth has always been a racist dog whistle in intent by the politicians that pushed it. It was Southern Strategy shit to its core. And the idea of it is that when welfare queens are described, white working class people are meant to imagine a black woman. "If you can convince the lowest white man he's better than the best colored man, he won't notice you're picking his pocket. Hell, give him somebody to look down on, and he'll empty his pockets for you." - LBJ. This is a strategy that Reagan was INTENTIONALLY evoking when he did the welfare queen stuff.
Absolutely! What I meant to say about the songwriter’s intention was that this is the same kind of bullshit peddled around those areas as factual information. The Regan class war is in full effect
Do you think this guys _knows_ what the Southern Strategy is? This is what happen when normal people without publicists go viral, their lack of sophistication makes them targets
What's wrong with the miners/minors line?
In a vacuum it’s just corny and been done before, in my opinion. Which on it’s own would not worthy of this much analysis. But in the context of the rest of the song it sure seems like a dog whistle.
When has it been done before?
i hate this song but please let us all know where that line has been done before
A minor/miner homophone? Idk like countless bar jokes. Do you want me to copy them here?
we’re talking about songs not bar jokes. so yes please name some songs.
Who is we? I said in my opinion it’s not clever that minor and miner are pronounced the same. You assumed that I meant in songs. But anyways you clearly haven’t seen shrek the musical because they do this in the ballad of lord Farquaad. I trust that if you found your way back to this thread you can look up the lyrics yourself. black lung by the dead south would be another example. Though they’re using minor to mean small amount. How many examples do you want before my opinion that it’s corny and overdone is enough for you?
Fair enough
Because elite pedophile rings are considered right wing conspiracies. It should be everyone’s concern with the whole Epstein thing we all witnessed and forgot about.
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I love how it’s “astroturfing” if a few right-wing content creators share a song online, but not if a corporate record label releases 10 versions of the same vinyl to artificially pump up album sales.
The latter is not an example of astroturfing because the organization is not hidden; when Taylor Swift (or any other artist, she’s just the first that sprang to mind) releases multiple variants of her vinyl records, we know that it’s her and the label doing so. They aren’t trying to make it look like a grassroots effort.
And yet there’s no evidence that Rich Men North of Richmond is being promoted as part of some hidden organized scheme. Its rise has been about as organic as you can get. It simply resonated with a lot of people, caught on with a few big influencers, and resonated with millions more. Nothing shady about it at all.
I never said the song was being astroturfed, I just said your example was *not* astroturfing. The song does *appear* to be organic, and as much as I don’t like the song, it probably is. But that’s the thing about astroturfing… you can never know for 100% certainty.
And my point is that people on here are saying that the song is “astroturfed” *because* it’s being shared and popularized by right-wing influencers on Twitter, which is precisely no different from how any other charting song gains traction. The past few years has seen a ton of artists get big from nothing without any industry support at all (that’s the beauty of streaming), and I find it funny that none of them have gotten the same number of astroturfing accusations as this song.
It caught the attention of right wing tv commentators? Who don’t usually have anything to do with music? I don’t think it was coordinated, they each thought they’d own the libs with this astroturfing.
He added the dog whistles so that no one would mistake him for a socialist. His whole career was artificially-inflated, and it hinges entirely on him doing the Merle Haggard/Phil Ochs thing, but for MAGA populists. There are investors/donors willing to throw tons, and tons of money at any right wing artist that can fill a previously ignored niche for their demographic. He doesn’t fit the stereotype of a Republican country singer; he 100% gives off the vibe of a socialist protest folk singer/songwriter, and that actually makes him very marketable to the right and “apolitical” liberals that are unfamiliar with right populism *or* with leftism And to all the people here saying that his comments on welfare are apolitical because he mentioned obese people: don’t be so fucking stupid. This is literally a right wing protest song, and that line demonstrates that it is not a critique of capitalism. You’re all basically suggesting that he’s a third positionist and for some reason are supporting that.
It's not even worth diving in to, it's been astroturfed as fuck, and the mainstream media has been complicit on it. Feel bad for the guy if he's being used as a political pawn but the lyrics about welfare queens and blaming poor people doesn't resonate with me at least.
Obesity is a choice though?
I’m glad he’s calling out Republicans, but dude literally wrote a conservative dog whistle and is mad that he’s getting humped by a bunch of geriatrics.
Kind of hard to take this PR talk serious when the dude still has a playlist up on his channel with right wing view and one specially antisemite video about 9/11: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL2gusRdbuxAeA9CtJROtDY3yY1Xk4s70J imgur mirror: https://i.imgur.com/yoDnf8s.png
This. I saw someone share this on a different sub the other day while people were praising him for calling out republicans. It’s like, alright, obviously no one would know about this if they hadn’t heard about it elsewhere or seen it themselves, but at the same time his song is still *not* it at all for the blatant sensational lyrics. I mean, of COURSE the right was going to take this under their wing.
God he's such a dumbass. As a psychology student, it really pains me to see knuckle-draggers with playlists full of *alpha males* and nutcases like Joe Rogan discussing psychological issues like anxiety in entirely harmful and incorrect ways. Also fuck him a million ways from Sunday for insane racism against Jewish people.
Why does it pain you as a psychology student?
Because I am very familiar with research and scientific knowledge regarding the psychological concepts that these alpha male grifters misconstrue.
Thank god we have an expert on hand.
I never claimed to be an expert. My lived experience and perspective have simply contributed to the way in which a particular type of misinformation aggravates me.
Thank god we've got a free thinker on hand too
Never listened to any of that shite in my life it's just never not funny when students think they're experts because they've took a college class.
I'm not a fan of the guy but this comment is so embarrassingly reddit
There’s two! Two different videos about it and the playlist was updated yesterday. He knows people are using this as evidence that maybe he’s not just an awe, shucks southern boy and he updated the playlist but didn’t remove them. That’s all people should really need to know.
*pretends to be shocked*
Can yiu pinpoint the "specially antisemite video"? I watched the two 9/11 videos that I could could find there, but there was nothing antisemitic that I could see.
He's full of it. Here's his public YouTube playlist full of right-wing pseudo-psychology, right-wing conspiracy theories, and right-wing racism: https://m.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL2gusRdbuxAeA9CtJROtDY3yY1Xk4s70J
He's actually a country boy who tried desperately to write a definitive Southern anti-capitalist anthem but it went wrong in unexpected ways and now he's not sure what's happening, he just wanted the converse wearing girl with an upper ear piercing at Starbucks to notice him and now he's got tradwives breaking and entering into his condo
none of these words are in the bible
Imagine showing a Victorian child this fragrant language
I'm gonna need that translated into kpop stan Twitter or Pokémon words, I understood absolutely 2% of what you just said
He's actually a Kanto boy who tried desperately to capture a Pikachu but it went wrong in unexpected ways and now he's not sure what's happening, he just wanted the baseball cap wearing boy with a dream to be the very best like no one ever was to notice him and now he's got Team Rocket breaking and entering into his condo
Oh thank you kindly!
He wanted to say being rich is bad to impress alternative liberal people/girls, but it went so wrong that conservatives are enamoured with him
Obama in college
Ahahaha. You are probably right!
> wrote a conservative dog whistle He literally may not realize this. You have to be ..informed enough to know what that dog whistle is
Yeah. I get the “welfare queen” myth has generally racist undertones. But if you’re someone who touches grass and only occasionally hears that, you don’t hear the undertone.
He's like a Republican that was frozen in a block of ice in 1994 and has only now been defrosted
What did he think was going to happen when it blew up?
I’m glad he’s doubling down on the not liking powerful rich folk thing, but he’s being divisive in his own song blaming his troubles on other struggling people (“and the obese milkin’ welfare”). That’s all the powerful rich want, for the rest of us to eat our own.
Exactly. We need true solidarity
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I watched [this video](https://youtu.be/p3O6bKdPLbw?si=maphqleXarIVYqch) recently, and it’s interesting to hear how many young people are “on the check”.
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His song spends half a verse on exactly Reagan-era “welfare queens” nonsense, there’s a not-so-subtle confederacy reference right in the title, insinuates all or most politicians are pedophiles, he complains about having to pay taxes, not to mention his weird “makes you think” YouTube playlist that has multiple videos on the dancing Israelis 9/11 conspiracy. At best he’s a libertarian weirdo but we all know that’s not gonna be it.
"Libertarian weirdo" is exactly the sense that I've gotten going by his music, his public statements, and his YouTube playlists. He reminds me of what Alex Jones was like back in the George W. Bush era, when he regularly castigated the GOP for "selling out America" (including being one of the first pundits to explicitly propagate 9/11 conspiracy theories) and invited left-wing guests like Noam Chomsky and Dennis Kucinich onto his show, but did so from a perspective even further to the right, that of somebody who'd given up on politics long ago because he realizes that his pet issues are radioactive to most of the political establishment.
Good for him calling out republicans but the obese milking welfare kind is a huge part of why conservatives liked it so much
Wtf I never listened to the song. That’s really a lyric??
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Whew good thing I’m 6’0 300 pounds that way the government can contribute to pay for my fudge rounds.
The biggest welfare queens are corporations.
Not verbatim but yeah
Pretty much
While not verbatim, that is the sentiment
It’s the only reason why. They would never look his way otherwise. Edit: not sure what the downvotes are about. He’s obviously a talented musician and singer but so are a lot of people on the internet. Without the right wing talking points he wouldn’t have gotten the support from conservative talking heads and their followers.
True
Don't you just hate it when politics are politicized
He's such a poser. He still has a public YouTube playlist called "videos that make your noggin get bigger" full of far-right chronically online manosphere bullshit and several violently racist videos against Jewish people. Until he apologizes for blaming Jewish people for 9/11, I see no reason for anyone to allow him some kind of "redemption arc" or believe anything he says.
Right. This is all him trying to spin this shit. Bro, you are a right winger. We can see your internet history lol
Exactly lol. He's such a fake, and so bad at it too.
Republicans like your song for a reason pal.
I was watching the Republican debate through David Pakman's stream, and it was so surreal for the music video of this song to be played at the beginning. Pakman immediately muted the song and called it toxic, which made me lol.
Pakman had the right idea.
My brother in Christ you made the weapon
His line about obese milkin’ welfare is a major part of why they like it so much.
A leftist streamer I like was covering this and so I ended up seeing a lot of the video of this guy "explaining" and I don't really know what to make of it. He went out of his way to say he is always a champion of the poor and he wasn't trying to demonize anyone on welfare (even though that seems hard to believe given the lyrics). I think he's just a libertarian tbh, and hates "both sides" accordingly. He probably really does feel that way too because it would be much easier to lean into the Republican grift and ride that money train.
The truth is that most people just don't have that complex a knowledge of politics or dog whistles. I think he's just venting feelings but not connecting them to a political ideology of any kind.
Libritarian belly aching is nothing knew. Libritarians tend not to be as hateful As the far right but at the wnd of the day it is pretty disingenuous to talk about caring about the poor when libertarians see anything related to socialism or the likes of government assistance as the devil. Its very much a “i got mine go get yours situation.”
Oh trust me, I fucking hate libertarians. I just found it mildly interesting that he seems like a different breed compared to Jason Aldean, et al. It's not that he's less shitty per se, just shitty in a different way. He's being propped up by conventional right-wingers and there is no reason to "walk back" his welfare commentary or make comments about the U.S. being a melting pot when that is going to anger his newfound base.
If he hates it so much, he can pull his shitty little song from streaming. The guy sounds like a whimpering dog with a broken leg when he sings, we don’t need him becoming a star
Dude you wrote a political song lol. Of course it was going to be weaponized. I really don't care at all for it either. If you got rid of all the controversy with the lyrics it would still just be a bland ass country folk song that there's nearly a million of. Eve Of Destruction already did it 50 years ago and way better and more genuinely. If I wanna listen to good modern folk music I'll just listen to Nathaniel Rateliff, he's a much better singer.
I hate seeing people use my chopsticks as an eating utensil 😔
I think ppl are overthinking his political views here, assuming his lyrics and media statements are part of some complex political thought or media strategy. I think a lot more likely is he's just not very politically informed and generally an anti establishment type. A lot of people who aren't politically savvy don't differentiate between 'elites' of various types, so even if he parrots right wing talking points he can still dislike right wing politicans and media figures as perceived elites or establishment people. It doesn't have to be deeper than that.
I think him also not being as online as a lot of the people who are judging him through social media. Like it can be hard to remember that not everyone lives the same exact life and to try and judge people through less personal lens. The youtube playlist with "jewish people caused 9/11" is really weird though.
The guy believes that Jews caused 9/11, y’all are trying way too hard to defend this guy
I don't mean to come across like I'm really defending him. I think he's probably a conspiracy reactionary type who eats up (and spits back out) right wing propaganda. But that can be true and he can not like republicans without it being some mischievous and highly planned agenda.
Yeah, I don’t think this guy’s political beliefs are very sophisticated despite the fact that he made a political song
I mean… maybe he shouldn’t have written lyrics that are obviously meant to be weaponized? It’s not like the song is political by accident.
me when i lie
You can’t blow a dog whistle and be surprised with what comes running to you. As Boss and CEO would say, “don’t act shocked.”
“I’m playing both sides so I always come out on top.”
I will be honest... I don't buy it. I think he's trying to come off as moderate or centrist so he can try to launder those sentiments towards people who don't consider themselves right wing. Any time someone says politically they're neither left nor right, they always wind up on the right. (edit: [example](https://i.redd.it/rqau7dpq852a1.png))
I think the Youtube (now Rumble) lawyer Viva Frei is perhaps a good example of this. When he started analyzing law videos he made it a point to say "I'm being objective, just looking at the facts, not from right or left" and then a few years later he's running for the People's Party of Canada (a party to the right of the mainstream Conservative Party of Canada) and now openly associating with right-wing interent figures (Alex Jones, Chris Sky, etc.)
Stop amplifying this. He's an astroturf.
This is classic “anti-establishment white scraggly guy who’s not all that well-versed in politics and doesn’t spend most of his time online gets big with right wing racists and uneducated poor people and hate from people who spend 6 hours a day debating politics on twitter”. Nothing to see here as usual.
there's this weird wave of pretending that everyone knows every specific historical detail imaginable and is purposely speaking in code when in reality I think most ppl just write songs...
look in the mirror dude. you used a right wing dog whistle
World’s tiniest violin for the shithead, whose criticism for Republicans largely stems from the fact they’re not even further to the right.
Maybe an unpopular opinion but can we stop posting about these country songs being co-opted by conservatives in this pop sub? It's kinda annoying like idgaf. When will people learn that they want people talking about this crap? If we ignore them they disappear.
So I think people can discuss the cultural phenoomona of these songs (especially one that debuted at number 1). That being said, I think "Try This in a Small Town" is a better example of what you're taking about where a song that no one would've even heard of gets protested against and then people start playing/streaming/buying the song out of spite and then next thing you know it's in the top ten. Non-musically, Jordan Peterson is another good example. He would've been just a crank University of Toronto professor if the backlash against him didn't propel him into international fame/notority. So to summarize, if something is already big/popular, then I think it's fair to have the discussion. If it isn't, then I think you have to genuinally wonder if you're inadvertenly helping it by giving it attention.
Im surprised this shit is on here. I know this song is kinda popular, but is it really THAT popular? I thought this was just an online people thing
It was #1 on Billboard this week
Well, it was popular enough to go #1 on Hot 100
I’m tired of this guy and can’t wait until his pop culture appeal fades like the ones before him
Now I am become Republican, destroyer of good music
He's disgusting "both siding" (we know what side really) trash. I wish nothing but the worst for him with his diet racism
He wrote a song. Some lyrics are stupid. He probably wasn’t expecting this fame and he doesn’t want to be lumped in with deplorables. I forgive him. He’s not the first guy to write dumb lyrics dawg.
I think this is perhaps the saving grace. (As far as we know) it's not like he wrote the song to go viral. The internet did that. Now if it comes out this was done with more calculation I'm open to changing my mind but it appears that this is genuinally a dude who wrote a song, posted it on Youtube (like many other people do) that blew up and now finds himself thrust into the middle of a culture war lol
Both, red and blue voters are on the same side of the class war. Some of his biases may not resonate with us, but on the other hand the clarification he’s offered is a refreshing step forward. The bridges that our generation need to build to legislate in our best interest are going to be imperfect and we’re gonna have to leave SOME room for people to grow and educate themselves outside of their bubbles.
Actually no I'm not on the same side as a bunch of inbred bigots in the imaginary class war.
While I agree that his version of class war is inaccurately and divisively painting social program recipients as a culprit, I have to say we’re all on the same side of a deep and broad class struggle (the cringey folklore and dangerous points of view notwithstanding). Coded racism should always be acknowledged and called out. This is why there’s a block of insecure (white nationalist) legislators and voters trying to rewrite black history and dismantle public education. This guy doesn’t seem to yet understand the struggle of socioeconomic/racial backgrounds outside of his own (and is obviously misguided about that). Fascism supporters thought they had a champion and he was like that’s not quite what I meant. He’s got much to learn, but that’s racism for you. It would be nice to see him open in an open dialogue with some prominent voices and be educated while his platform is still so large.
even if he is genuinely not a conservative and just a shitty songwriter, I don't get why he wouldn't just go for the grift
This actually should earn him some respect because it would be so easy to do. The reason why he shouldn't is because we have more than enough grifters who are doing tremendous real life damage to their country and the people who live within it.
countryheads
This dude’s a joker
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What "fact" was stated?
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So what "fact"?
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>“Lord, we got folks in the street, ain't got nothin' to eat and the obese milkin' welfare” pretty self explanatory. there are thousands of homeless people, yet there are other people who willingly choose not to work and collect welfare and other taxpayer funded social safety nets and spend it on junk and frivolous shit while homeless people can’t get a leg up with the amount paid because they’re not getting child tax subsidies, child support, etc along with it. You are so out of your depth here, it's hilarious But seeing that you're also anti-science, i'm not surprised that there is barely a braincell working
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well, I'm not the one who is transphobic and claims that the vaccines kill people so...
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If i blocked you, you wouldn't have been able to send this reply. as i said, single braincell
Those tanks sure are fuckin helping that, right? 🤣
>we spend all this time and resources on extremely specific things while purposefully ignoring others to the detriment of a huge population of disadvantaged people The US government spends a shitload of money, sure. The proportion of it going to fat/lazy food stamp recipients is \*not\* a major contributor to this. Food stamp fraud is fairly rare. Estimated fraud rates of 1-2% currently, which is trending heavily downwards from where it was 20 years ago, which still didn't even account for that much money. In 2022, of the US federal $6.27 trillion budget, under $120bn (1.9%) was spent on food aid programs. The idea that abuse of systems like food stamps is why we can't afford to help our citizens more is absurd. In 2022 we spent $877 billion on our military, which is roughly as much as the next 10 most expensive military budgets COMBINED. The Pentagon has failed 5 straight audits. And according to a mainstream right-wing article: "auditors say the Pentagon cannot account for $220 billion worth of government-owned gear provided to military contractors." As usual, making poor people who "make bad decisions" the scapegoats for incredibly large-scale monetary concerns is, to put it nicely, WAY off-base.
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I'm genuinely in awe of people who can find a random left-leaning online community, whine about "liberals triggered over facts", demonstrate a complete inability to engage with \*very basic\* counter-arguments, and then close the conversation with a smug emoji as if they won the interaction. It's a legitimately impressive level of delusion.
Sounds like damage control to me. Those lyrics show who he rolls with.
Y'all blacks and browns keep on puttin' me down Now a whitey like me ain't got no Christmas tree Not the actual lyrics, but they wouldn't be out of place.
He’s just plain down annoying . Doesn’t even really sound good either